Monday, December 26, 2005

On the Second Day of Christmas....

Not much to add today. Was rolling through stations on the car radio yesterday as I headed off to my own parish for Christmas day mass (a sadly under-represented group in comparison to the standing room only packing of the C & E, let's get it out of the way as early as possible, crowd that attended the vigil of Santa Claus mass the night before. Remember, on the eve of the Solemnity of the Nativity of Our Lord. (How many can even tell us the full liturgical title of this Holy Day?

Well, back to the radio...was able to catch just a part of the weekly radio mass from the Cathedral St. John the Evangelist here in Milwaukee. After midnight mass, it was already known that the Archbishop himself would be jetting off (probably First Class) to St. Louis for a feast with family and benefactors there.

What strikes me is the succession for celebrants of this mass which is sent out to the entire diocese. The Cathedral pastor, Fr. Carl Last was the radio celebrant for Christmas. Why not the auxiliary bishop, or one of the vicars who have diocesan-wide responsibilities? Bishop Sklba, while a man with whom I have very little in common, would have been a better symbolic representation, but was concelebrating (there is a good use of resources) a mass with the publisher-priest of the Catholic Herald newspaper (no pillar of orthodoxy there). Where was the other psuedo-Vivar General, Fr. Curt Frederick? Or how about the Vicar Judicial, Fr. Paul Hartman? Both these latter are at least Dolan appointees.

Nope, instead of a representative of archdiocesan leadership, His Excellency has allowed another holdover from the previous administration to use the Archbishop's own pulpit for missions and messages contrary what the Archbishop sopposedly says he wishes to change. Go figure....

Thanks for the compliment. As for Fr. Curt Frederick, I use "psuedo" because his actual title is "Vicar for Clergy" but I have been told that he holds virtually all of the power of a vicar general. Bishop Sklba is the actual vicar general, so there might be some desire to be deferential to him.

As to whether or not the Archbishop is surrounding himself with losers....

Visit the website, www.archmil.org, and look under "About Us - Central Office Administration."

The list includes:

The previous regime's Auxiliary (you judge),the new vicar for clergy (jury is out, but is a member of the Priests Alliance),the previous regime's chancellor (an ex-nun),the previous regime's moneyman (he wrote the checks for the cover-ups),the previous regime's mouthpiece who got a promotion (the enabler for the sale of the old church at St. Mary's , Elm Grove),

Scroll down and see that His Excellency's other assitants include another ex-nun, and Brother Bob Smith. Little is known about the woman from Catholic Charities.

So, on the loser scale, I would say only one real winner (Br. Smith) and alot of question marks (and I am being very generous).

So, you might ask, why keep, much less promote, those not in the winner column. A tough question that only the Archbishop can answer for.

I would welcome this Blog being a place where names of solid, orthodox and committed priests can be commended.